1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a ribbon cable connector, more particularly to a ribbon cable connector, which has a plurality of unitary conductive members, each of the conductive members being capable of being placed between a grounding plate and a row of signal terminals for connecting the grounding plate electrically to a selected one of signal terminals.
2. Description of the Related Art
Referring to FIG. 1, a conventional ribbon cable connector 10 is shown to include an elongated terminal seat (10a) and an elongated clamping frame (10b), which are interconnected detachably by means of two snap fitting units (F). The clamping frame (10b) has a slotted clamping surface 101. The connector 10 is adapted to establish electrical connection with a ribbon cable (not shown) that is clamped between the terminal seat (10a) and the clamping frame (10b) and that includes a plurality of individually insulated parallel conductors. Some of the conductors are grounding conductors. The connector 10 further includes two ground terminal sets. As shown in FIGS. 2 and 2A, each of the ground terminal sets includes a grounding plate unit 11 and two rows of ground terminals 12, which are formed integrally with the grounding plate unit 11. The grounding plate unit 11 has a grounding plate 111, a plurality of notches 113, and a plurality of pressed contact legs 114, which are inclined relative to the grounding plate unit 11 and which are in electrical contact with a plurality of signal terminals (not shown), respectively. The pressed contact legs 114 are difficult to manufacture, and may bend or even break.
Referring to FIGS. 1, 2 and 2A, because only some of the signal terminals need to be connected electrically with the ground terminals, the contact legs 114 are formed on some predetermined positions on the grounding plate 111, which are decided according to the pattern of a printed circuit (not shown) that is connected electrically with the contact legs 114, thereby increasing the necessity of high precision when manufacturing the grounding plate unit 11. In assembly, when the clamping frame (10b) is moved toward the terminal seat (10a) to clamp the grounding plate unit 11, the ground terminals 12, and the ribbon cable (not shown) between the clamping frame (10b) and the terminal seat (10a) such that the terminals 12 piece through insulation of the ribbon cable (not shown), because there is no support for the ground terminals 12 and the ribbon cable (not shown), the ground terminals 12 deform to an extent that results in poor electrical contact between the ground terminals 12 and the ribbon cable (not shown) and in varying orientation of the contact legs 114. Variation in orientation of the contact legs 114 results in poor electrical contact thereof with the signal terminals (not shown).